1 The Horse and His Trainer

Sylvia Blaze.

Chapter 1 The Horse and His Trainer The story had gripped the nation. In late September 1890, all anyone was talking about was the disappearance of the great racehorse Silver Blaze and the tragic murder of his trainer. "We shall have to go, Watson," my friend Sherlock Holmes said to me as we sat down to breakfast one morning. "Go? Where to?" "To Dartmoor, to see if we can solve this Silver Blaze business." I shouldn't have been surprised. As England's greatest detective, it was only natural that Holmes should wish to take on this case.

And so it was that an hour or so later, Holmes and I found ourselves in a compartment of a first- class carriage flying toward Exeter. Holmes spent the first half of the journey with his sharp, eager face buried in newspaper reports of the crime. Finally, he shoved these under his seat and turned to me. "It seems," he said, "that Silver Blaze was the expected winner at the Wessex Cup horse race next Tuesday. He is the nation's top racehorse, and the public had bet enormous sums of money on him. That means that rival stables would have been glad if he didn't compete.

"Of course, the owner of Silver Blaze, Colonel Ross, knew this, and he made sure the horse was well guarded at his stables at King's Pyland. The people in charge there were the trainer, John Straker, and three stableboys. Straker had worked for the colonel for thirteen years—five as a jockey and seven as a trainer—and had always shown himself to be honest and dedicated. The stableboys are also, apparently, of good character. One of the lads sat up each night in the stables while the other two slept in the loft. Straker lived in a small villa about two hundred yards from the stables. He had a wife, no children, and one maidservant.

"King's Pyland is in a remote part of north Dartmoor. The nearest town, Tavistock, lies two miles to the east, and two miles west is Mapleton Stables. Apart from that, they're surrounded by wild, empty moorland. "On Tuesday evening, when this happened, the horses had been exercised and watered as usual and the stables were locked at nine o'clock. Two of the lads walked up to Straker's house where they had supper in the kitchen, while the third, Ned Hunter, remained on guard. "A few minutes after nine, the maid, Edith Baxter, walked over to the stables with Ned's supper, a dish of curried mutton. She took no water as there was a water tap in the stables and

the rule was that the lad on duty should drink from that. The maid carried a lantern with her as the path ran through the open moor, which was very dark. "When she was some thirty yards from the stables, Baxter saw a man appear out of the gloom. He was dressed like a gentleman in a tweed suit and a red silk cravat. He carried a heavy walking stick with a knob for a handle. "'Can you tell me where I am?' he asked. 'I'd almost decided to sleep on the moor when I saw the light of your lantern.' "'You're close to King's Pyland stables,' she replied.